Madras High Court: In a civil appeal filed under Section 19 of the Family Courts Act, 1984, read with Section 28 of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, seeking to set aside the order and decree passed by the Additional Principal Family Court, Chennai, the Division Bench of J. Nisha Banu and R. Sakthivel*, JJ. set aside the orders of the Family Court. The petition filed by the husband seeking dissolution of marriage was allowed, while the petition filed by the wife for restitution of conjugal rights was dismissed. Consequently, the marriage between the parties was dissolved by a decree of divorce.
The Court clarified that, notwithstanding the decree of divorce, the wife and the minor child would continue to have the right to claim maintenance or enhanced maintenance under the Hindu Adoptions and Maintenance Act, 1956, or any other applicable laws. The judgment granting divorce would not, in any manner, affect the wife’s entitlement to maintenance.
Background
The parties were married in 2015 and had a son. Due to arising disputes, the husband filed a divorce petition in 2017, under Section 13(1)(i-a) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955, before the Family Court.
Judgments in both cases were delivered, dismissing the husband’s divorce petition and allowing the wife’s plea for restitution of conjugal rights.
Aggrieved by the outcome, the husband filed the present appeal.
The husband alleged that the wife refused to live with his parents and insisted on a separate residence, leading to frequent conflicts. He claimed that the wife lived with him for only 51 days in the two years after their marriage. According to him, she ill-treated him, belittled his rural background, and regularly left for her parental home without valid reason.
The husband further stated that the wife was quarrelsome, verbally abusive, and imposed unreasonable demands, such as insisting he return home by 5 p.m., despite his job at an engineering college requiring later hours. She allegedly threatened suicide and false dowry allegations.
During the pendency of the original petitions, the wife lodged a police complaint making serious and defamatory allegations, including sexual harassment by the husband’s father and immoral conduct by the husband. This compelled the husband to seek anticipatory bail. She later filed a domestic violence case which was quashed by the High Court.
Additional complaints to various authorities were also made by the wife, but she failed to appear for inquiries, and all cases were eventually closed. The husband contended that these acts amounted to cruelty, caused him severe mental trauma, and made reconciliation impossible. He, therefore, sought the dismissal of the wife’s petition for restitution of conjugal rights and requested that his petition for divorce be allowed.
Issue
Whether the police complaint given by the wife against the husband and her father-in-law amounts to cruelty and whether the husband has made out a case under Section 13 (1) (i-a) of H.M. Act?
Analysis and Decision
The Court observed that a perusal of the parties’ oral evidence indicated that they had lived together for approximately two years following their marriage. The husband’s claim that the wife had lived with him for only 51 days during this period was not substantiated by any credible evidence.
The Court further noted that it was natural for a newlywed woman to frequently visit her parental home, where she had spent most of her life. Moreover, since the wife became pregnant shortly after the marriage, it was customary for her to stay with her mother during the later stages of pregnancy. These actions, the Court held, could not be construed as cruelty.
The Court noted that one of the allegations made by the husband was that, under pressure from the wife, he was forced to resign from his job at the engineering college and take up employment in an IT company. However, this allegation was not supported by any acceptable or credible evidence.
The Court further observed that the evidence on record indicated the couple had led a typical marital life with the usual ups and downs until the birth of their child. It was only after the husband filed the divorce petition that serious allegations emerged. As seen from the wife’s oral testimony, the wife had lodged a complaint in 2017, at the All-Women Police Station. In the complaint, she accused both the husband and his father of sexual misconduct, describing them as perverts. She alleged that her father-in-law had sexually harassed her and that the husband was involved in casual relationships with multiple women.
The Court noted that in 2017, the wife had withdrawn the earlier complaint by submitting a letter marked. This withdrawal letter bore the signatures of the wife, her parents, and her brother as witnesses. The wife specifically stated that certain allegations made against her husband and father-in-law had inadvertently crept in without her knowledge.
However, during the proceedings, the wife contended that she withdrew the complaint only based on a written assurance from the husband that he would reunite with her. The Complaint Closure Report lent some probability to this claim.
Despite this assurance, the husband failed to reunite with the wife, contrary to what was promised before the police. The Court observed that, under such circumstances, the wife ought to have acted prudently by reopening the complaint and seeking a proper investigation. However, she failed to do so.
Notwithstanding this, the Court observed that whether the serious allegations made were true or not was a matter requiring police investigation and trial. Since no such investigation had taken place, the allegations remained unestablished. The Court held that unless proven, such defamatory statements could amount to mental cruelty. If the allegations were indeed true, the wife should have taken necessary steps to substantiate them, especially after the husband failed to honor his commitment to reunite. The Court concluded that unsubstantiated and uncorroborated defamatory averments caused stigma and mental agony to the husband and his family, and in the circumstances of the case, amounted to cruelty.
The Court further noted that the wife had sought restitution of conjugal rights nearly 3½ years after the husband filed for divorce. She claimed that she had remained hopeful of reconciliation and cited family dynamics at her parental home as a reason for her delayed legal action. While the wife expressed a willingness to resume marital life, the Court found that the husband’s refusal to reunite was justified in light of the mental cruelty he had suffered.
The Court held that the husband’s apprehensions were reasonable, particularly in view of the serious defamatory and sexual allegations made by the wife against him and his father. These could not be disregarded. The couple had lived separately for eight years with no significant progress toward reconciliation. The matter had been referred to mediation in 2024, but the parties failed to reach any consensus.
The Court concluded that the unproven sexual allegations made by the wife amounted to cruelty, and accordingly, the husband had established a case under Section 13(1)(i-a) of the Hindu Marriage Act, 1955. The issues raised in the appeals were answered in favour of the husband, and he was granted a decree of divorce.
It was also observed that the husband had been paying a monthly maintenance of ₹25,000 to the wife and their 8-year-old son, who remained in the wife’s custody. Considering the overall facts and particularly the wife’s willingness to move forward and resume the relationship, the Court held that while the decree of divorce would be granted, the wife’s right to receive maintenance would remain unaffected.
[V.Rajesh v. S. Anupriya, CMA Nos.1038 and 1039 of 2024, decided on 04-06-2025]
*Judgment Authored by: Justice R. Sakthivel
Advocates who appeared in this case :
For Appellant: Mr.V.Kamalanathan
For Respondent: Ms.R.Mahalakshmi